I always thought that, at this point in their respective careers, Kidd was a much better court leader than Lin. He came into this league pretty respected - sharing NBA ROY does that to you. He had better court vision and made better decisions. And I know that statistics might show the two players average the same number of assists or rebounds or PPG, but I've always been more of an eye-test guy that used statistics as verification, not as proof.
Wow extensive post. Really interesting read. Honestly I think comparing a player that has yet to start a full NBA season to anyone is a little to much. Even calling Lin a poor man CP3 is overly generous. When Lin was struggling I agreed that comparing him to Kidd was foolish. Now Lin is playing better but still comparing him to a future HOFer is still to much. I think right now what we can say based on everything he has done thus far in his entire career, good & bad, is that he is a young player who is inconsistent but solid with a really high ceiling. How high the celling nobody knows, maybe he will end up being Conley type PG or maybe he will develop into better. Just a few thoughts.
I've been saying it for the past month - what was missing from Lin's game was assertiveness and confidence in himself. He was struggling mentally with the Harden on the floor and even off not sure of himself. The MSQ was his 2nd "Linsanity" - just the confidence boost he needed. Honestly their wasn't much coaching adjustments compared to prior games. The coaching has adopted to his increased aggressiveness, but it's pretty much the same plays they ran before when he was struggling. The difference is Lin. He was deferring to much to Harden and now he is taking the reins and the difference is showing. This is the Lin we've all been waiting for and I am glad he's finally come around. To those who say the coaches all of a sudden changed - I mean, that's ridiculous. The plays are the same! The only difference is Lin looks to score and initiate the offense much more now instead of just deferring to Harden.
Their situations are and were different. Kidd's teams always did a lot of cutting, which exploits his court vision to the full. Whereas the Rockets hardly ever cut, forcing Lin to do a lot of driving. If we were playing something like Sloan's flex offense, you would be amazed at Lin's ability to stand back and still control the halfcourt by finding cutters -- just like Kidd. Lin did some of that during Linsanity, and even more of that after it, under Woodson.
The fallacy in this is in the tape. Throughout his struggles they were still setting picks for him at the top of the key, but he would not turn the corner, he'd take them, find the defender switching, and then just look for Harden. That's not the coaches fault - that's his fault. You guys think the coaches tell these guys exactly what to do on the court. They don't. They show them plays. but these guys are NBA players. And the coaches understand that Lin knows what to do, but has to have the confidence to go out there and do it. And what's more. Why would you not give credit to Lin for turning things around? Give the player credit - he admitted he was playing passively and then came out and played aggressively and changed everything. He admitted that. So why blame the coaches still? C'mon LOF - Lin is great, but don't turn him into a god. He manned up, and let's all be happy and give him credit. You guys are arguing that is was so weak of a player that just a few coaching tweaks can make such a difference??? I give Lin the credit - this is all on him. He earned it. No one gave it to him. Not last year, not this year.
Speaking of those first two games. The way that both players are situated is now is really quite identical to what it was in those two games. Lin is either at the top of the key for the high PNR or on the left wing running the side PNR driving to his right hand side. Also in the first two games they were setting screens for each other & running back door cuts. Both guys have really high IQ's & knew what was up long before the coaches did. To be fair with the coaches I commend the approach they took it likely wasn't easy & they stuck to there guns & didn't flip flop like dorboro said. They had to get harden acclimated with the team ASAP and the best way to do that was to give him the ball & let him figure it out with the team. There is only one ball so when one guy is working the high PNR the other is useless. I think after Harden was finally clicking with the rest of the roster they started to work on blending the two together. That is why we are seeing a lot of the Lin harden PNR now to get Lin a shot. I think as that continues to develop we could see Harden spotting up more as well off of that 1-2 PNR or rolling to the basket also which is what I have wanted to see since day one. Or the Lin Asik PNR with Harden spotting up. Hopefully we can bring back more back door cuts as well, those are fun. Just a few thoughts.
Very nice post agree with most of everything you said. I agree Lin had a big confidence issue he broke through. I would only say that I don't believe Sampson was very good while he struggled through that. I still don't like sampson he makes me want to take a shower if I listen to much to him. Anyway thanks for the posts good reading.
I am happy that Jeremy Lin is playing well now. More importantly, I am happy that he is continuously IMPROVING various facets of his game. He will have some bad games here and there, but I am OK with it. The main thing is that he continues to strive towards his ceiling. Which, at this point, for someone who was undrafted, looks pretty damn high.....
You have not explained why Lin would so often pass midcourt and immediately dump the ball to someone else -- to Harden, Parsons, even Morris. No pnr, no attempt at turning any corner. Just an immediate dump off, followed by camping in the corner. You think Lin <b>wanted</b> to do that? When the very first time he didn't have to do it, he exploded for 38/7 against the Spurs? No, it had to be the coaches who forced Lin to be a spot up, corner camping SG.
This kind of stuff is so tired and annoying -- without hesitation, I get rid of posters who pull this garbage. durvasa is a highly intelligent poster who looks for stats, numbers and analysis ... he has an open mind and forms opinions based on facts. You, on the other hand, have a ridiculous opinion that you throw out there with an attempt to destroy a reputation without an ounce of proof. I wouldn't trade 1 durvasa for a billion of you. Remember when Kelvin Sampson was racist for playing Toney Douglas over Jeremy Lin in overtime? I guess he just became some open-minded individual all of a sudden. Remember when Kevin McHale WANTED Jeremy Lin to fail because he wanted to prove he was right to cut him in the first place? Because clearly Kevin McHale knew Jeremy Lin would not attack the basket before like he's doing now. Open your eyes. Fairly obvious that Jeremy Lin has been effective lately because he has found his way -- his confidence is up and he is being more aggressive in going to the basket. Part of being a young player with upside is they're going to go through ups and downs until they get more experience and confidence, and I'm sure we will still see some swings. There's no need to be an immature dolt and blame everyone else for the downs.
You know what? I think I went too far with my theorizing on why Lin didn't perform as well earlier. I shouldn't put it all on Lin. He's a young PG trying to find his way, and it could very well be that the coaches didn't do enough earlier in the season to figure out how to maximize his strengths. Honestly, I haven't watched most of the games this season so I'm not going to pretend like I know with certainty what really happened there. My position has always been the young, less established players need to earn their coach's trust and it shouldn't just be gifted to them. Lin was struggling big time scoring off of pick-and-rolls and isolation, according to Synergy. I imagine that lack of efficiency had something to do with the coaches being slow in turning Lin into a featured player in the offense. Lin, to his credit, seized an opportunity in the SAS game to show what he's capable of. And as a team, we've been doing a much better job in finding quick scores in transition of late, which puts less pressure on our half court execution. This makes it easier for the coaches to let Lin run the show.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p>Yesterday on radio heard SAS say Knicks made right move by letting Lin go now, but it will be the wrong move in future. Way to take a stand</p>— Michael O'Brien (@thenotoriousmob) <a href="https://twitter.com/thenotoriousmob/status/283967271129464832" data-datetime="2012-12-26T16:07:27+00:00">December 26, 2012</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script> LOL
I agree with much of what you said. Things are rarely black & white it is often somewhere in the middle. The last point you made is really interesting to me. I think that the Rockets finally adopting that up tempo style has really helped them. I think it allowed Lin to get a lot of easy buckets in transition which allowed him to get into a rhythm. Credit to Lin for significantly improving his transition game this off season otherwise things would have been a whole lot worse. Afterwards he started to become a lot more aggressive in the half court which is what we wanted to see all along & his teammates have started to look for him more as well. The Chicago game he was really aggressive in the half court & he asserted himself a lot more demanding the ball etc. A lot of the shots he was making yesterday was some of what I saw him doing in NY which is a positive step in the right direction. I think as we continue to push the pace we will always have success even if players have off shooting nights in the half court. The fact that we are winning also helps reiterate the message of pushing the pace, players tend to remember key messages when they see the success that comes from it as a result. Just a few thoughts.
Could be that after seeing Harden go HAM after the first two games made Lin more passive. I doubt both coaches would lie it just makes no sense.
Opposing teams will figure out a way to combat this fast-paced offense, much like they do for individual players.
WTF. Seriously? You haven't even seen most of the games but you've been sitting here arguing with people who have religiously watched and re-watched the games... sigh...
